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New Autobio By Film Editor Paul Hirsch Has Hitchcock/Herrmann/Psycho Stuff

posted 5 years ago by ecarle (14979)
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I was Xmas gifted a new bio book by film editor Paul Hirsch, entitled "A Long Time Ago in a Cutting Room Far Away," a not-so-veiled reference to the fact that Hirsch edited the very first Star Wars(and took the stage along with George Lucas' then-wife, Marcia, also a film editor, to pick up an Oscar.)

Its a book about a fascinating profession within filmmaking, and Hirsch dutifully doles out some tips about his work, both technical(a "perf" isn't a performance, its a perforation on the film) and creative(as when he describes how a re-edit at the end of Planes Trains and Automobiles changed the ending for the better.)

Interestingly -- given Eddie Murphy's recent triumphant return on SNL for a night -- Hirsh lists the 2002 Eddie Murphy film "Pluto Nash" as single-handedly ending his career(for awhile.) He was fired off the film, and then "Pluto Nash" was such a megabomb that his very affiliation with it kept him from GETTING work for awhile. He was jinxed by the movie(and yet...Eddie continued.)

The book also reminds us that its not just screenwriters who can "peak early" and have to search for work for decades thereafter(see: Joe Stefano.) One finds Hirsch always "looking for the next film to cut," sometimes getting offers, but sometimes going months without a job.

Still, Pluto Nash and the job struggles come rather late in the book. In the 70's, Hirsch signed on first with Brian DePalma and later with George Lucas(for only the first two Star Wars, he was not given the job on the third, for specific reasons having nothing to do with him.)

For DePalma, Hirsch did quite a few films. Early on there was "Sisters"(1973) which mixed elements of Psycho and Rear Window. And here's where Bernard Herrmann came into Hirsch's life.

Long story short: Sisters producer Ed Pressman hadn't raised all the money to finish production on Sisters, so he had DePalma and Hirsch rig up the scariest scene - a butcher knife murder of a man -- to show potential investors. It was decided by Hirsch that he wanted to screen this murder with the shower kill music from "Psycho." Which involved going to a record store; finding no copies of the Psycho score; having to order one by mail (He made sure to spell Herrmann with "two rs and two ns"); getting the record, putting the music to the Sisters killing -- and screening it for investors.

Sisters got the money. Thus "Psycho" saved "Sisters."

Having used "Psycho" on the "Sisters" clip, DePalma and Hirsch set out to hire Herrmann himself. Here the book gets into the usual stuff about Hitchcock firing Herrmann off of Torn Curtain, but adds Herrmann's quote from Hitchcock about that score. Hitch told him "this is the same old shit!" Yet again reminding us that Hitchcock wasn't all that nice a guy, and that he evidently held little awe for the scores that made Vertigo and Psycho classics as much as Hitch's work.

Some of Hirsch's stories have been told before by DePalma: How, when shown Sisters with "Psycho" music, Herrmann yelled "turn that off!" ; how Herrmann told DePalma his movie needed scare music right at the beginning because "they will wait for horror in Psycho because he's Hitchcock, they won't wait for you"; and the story I really like for its "chill factor": Hitchcock was so little pleased in his first cut of Psycho(without the music) that he contemplated cutting it down for an episode of his TV show. (And I can SEE that episode, I suppose even truncated, it might have been the best Hitchcock episode of all time.)

When Herrmann agrees to fly to New York from London to talk "Sisters," DePalma and Hirsch wonder what to call him. They settle on "Bernie," until he shows up and tells them he goes by "Benny." (The title of this chapter is: "My Next Big Break: Benny.")

There follow some good personal stories of Hirsch putting together a good relationship with Benny. I like a bit where Benny signs some autographs with musical bars and notes. He tells Hirsch: "For those kids, I just signed the first four notes of Psycho." I also like how Herrmann won't do "Sisters" unless budget money is found for a orchestra of a certain size for a certain number of limited days. Herrmann wasn't going to skimp. (Note in passing: around this time, William Friedkin met with Herrmann about scoring The Exorcist, but the arrogant Friedkin wouldn't make the hire -- imagine, Psycho and The Exorcist could have had the same composer!)

Perhaps most poignant and fitting is this story about "Benny": His final score was for "Taxi Driver." He was embroiled in a long final day of conducting and scoring, going into the night. Someone said "let's call it a night and come back tomorrow, we're almost done anyway." But Benny said: "No, we must finish it tonight." They finished the score that night, Benny went home -- and died in his sleep.

Lots of other stories in the book -- including the one about how you can find the final three notes of Psycho in Star Wars . Recommended.

[–] swanstep (2715) 5 years ago

Hirsch's book sounds like fun. He's one of the big personnel links between De Palma & Lucas. In general it's fascinating how cross-pollinating those two were around 1975-1976. Star Wars & Carrie had joint casting calls/auditions IIRC.

There was a great vid. 2 years ago about Star Wars' being 'saved in the edit' (much more so than most films, although less so than Best Pic. Annie Hall which was restructured and rewritten into a different genre by editor Ralph Rosenblum):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFMyMxMYDNk

I wonder whether Hirsch's book will motivate an update of this?

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Hirsch's book sounds like fun. He's one of the big personnel links between De Palma & Lucas.

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I haven't finished the book yet...not sure if Spielberg got around to him. Hirsch does point out that Spielberg was already working on what would be Close Encounters while Herrmann was still alive, and Herrman was under consideration to do THAT score.

Indeed, what a tragedy for Herrmann. Had he lived, say 10 more years(into his 70s), he likely would have been the "go to guy" for DePalma(who had him set for Carrie) Scorsese, possibly Spielberg. As Herrmann told DePalma and Hirsch: "The new guys want me!"

Still , Herrmann went out with a double Oscar nomination -- for Obsession and Taxi Driver in 1976. But he lost to Jerry Goldsmith(The Omen); Goldsmith himself had no speech prepared he was so sure Herrmann would win. There seemed to be as much Oscar jealousy about Herrmann as there was for Hitchcock.

And I read somewhere, one time only, that Hitchcock himself reached out to Herrmann to score "Family Plot" -- a possible reconciliation right at the very end that didn't happen. Herrmann was busy. So the great John Williams did it -- but called Herrmann for permission.

[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

In general it's fascinating how cross-pollinating those two were around 1975-1976. Star Wars & Carrie had joint casting calls/auditions IIRC.

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Yes. Amy Irving was up for Princess Leia ...but got a consolation role in Carrie, instead. And somehow she got Spielberg as a husband...these weren't auditions for HIS movies.

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There was a great vid. 2 years ago about Star Wars' being 'saved in the edit' (much more so than most films, although less so than Best Pic. Annie Hall which was restructured and rewritten into a different genre by editor Ralph Rosenblum):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFMyMxMYDNk

I wonder whether Hirsch's book will motivate an update of this?

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Possibly. As I say, I haven't finished the book, there may be more stories to add.

Its funny. Versus Hitchcock's "I wish I didn't have to film the movie"(given that it was all pre-planned in his head with a solid script, in the good days), we have these various movies that were totally saved and re-arranged in the editing room in the free wheeling 70's. Helluva way to roll the dice with those big budgets.

Of course, we've learned that Hitchcock actually allowed for a LOT of improvisation, line changing, shot changing -- though usually following a script. And I did read that he moved some scene in Family Plot to earlier in the movie(exposition with Dern and Harris, as I recall.)

The somewhat villainous William Friedkin(NOW a nice guy on DVD documentaries about Hitchcock; THEN a real tyrant) wrote in HIS autobio that he only found the endings for his movies "in the editing room." Its why The French Connection gets a bit incoherent at the end, and -- to Al Pacino's fury -- its why it is suggested that Pacino is a killer of gay men at the end of Cruising(Pacino said he didn't sign on for that interpretation, and was upset that Freidkin recut the film to suggest it.)

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[–] ecarle (14979) 5 years ago

Best Pic. Annie Hall which was restructured and rewritten into a different genre by editor Ralph Rosenblum)

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Might I ask: how so? What genre?

This would be another explanation why Woody didn't come to the Oscar ceremony that year -- maybe he knew Rosenblum was the REAL auteur.

I had mixed emotions years later when Woody finally DID come to the Oscar ceremony to honor New York City films(with clips) in 2002 after 9/11. It was great to see "the impossible"(Woody at the Oscars) -- but it felt a little egotistical on his part to suggest "OK, 3,000 people died in a historic tragedy -- NOW I'll show up."

[–] swanstep (2715) 5 years ago

Best Pic. Annie Hall which was restructured and rewritten into a different genre by editor Ralph Rosenblum)
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Might I ask: how so? What genre?

Originally and all the way through primary shooting & up to the 2.5 hour first cut six weeks into editing the Annie/Alvy romance was a sub-plot. Overall at that point the film was a very free-wheeling, 81/2-ish exploration of Alvy's mental state as a comedian turning 40. That film was called 'Anhedonia' (the inability to experience pleasure, i.e., Alvy's inability). This version had a basketball game between the Knicks & great philosophers, a trip to Nazi Germany, another to the Garden of Eden and an elevator tour through all nine layers of hell, a sci-fi spoof, & a murder mystery that Annie& Alvy try to solve. Annie only shows up half way through that movie.

Rosenblum says of the first cut, “I felt that the film was running off in nine different directions … The film never got going... a kind of cerebral exercise.” Rosenblum admits that a lot of the stuff that he cut out *was* very funny... Allen & co-screenwriter Brickman resented Rosenblum's ruthless paring down of the film to a 90 minute romantic comedy. But it was that conception that guided all subsequent shooting & all the last minute rewrites and changes (e.g., the 'we need the eggs' narration ending was added after the first few test-screenings). Woody's *still* griping about how all this shook out. From 2015 doing press for From Rome With Love:

”Nobody understood anything that went on, and the relationship between myself and Diane Keaton was all anyone cared about. That was not what I cared about. That was one small part of another big canvas that I had. In the end, I had to reduce the film to just me and Diane Keaton and that relationship, so I was quite disappointed in the end of that movie, as I was with other films of mine that were very popular.”

[–] swanstep (2715) 5 years ago

Vanity Fair covered the basic story here:
https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/04/annie-hall-40th-anniversary-woody-allen-carol-kane-marshall-brickman

Anyhow, it's clear that Allen recycled a lot of the stuff he had to cut out of AH into Stardust Memories, Deconstructing Harry, & Manhattan Murder Mystery. Allen makes so many movies that nothing is wasted!